In the midst of the daily rush between home and work, hobbies, travel and meetings, between the multitude of responsibilities and stressful situations, it is worth taking a moment – literally a moment – to catch your breath and relax. Try these exercises and you’ll quickly see the difference!
Breathing exercises may seem trivial, but simplicity is where the power lies. There’s a reason we tell someone to take a deep breath before an exam, important speech, job interview, or other stressful moment. We just need to remember to breathe with our belly, not our chest!
In its most basic form, breathing exercises involve closing your eyes and calming your breathing, trying to lengthen it and make it a steady rhythm. Another way is to focus the eyes on a single, fixed object, breathing (in through the nose, out through the mouth) deeply and rhythmically, while freeing the mind of all thoughts. Then you can gently do some head turns or shoulder thrusts and hand shakes or foot circles.
You can also combine these exercises with aromatherapy and do them in a bathtub full of fragrant foam, with candles of your favorite scent burning.
Scanning your own body allows you not only to increase self-awareness, but also to relax. If you have the opportunity, lie down, if not, at least sit comfortably. Then we close our eyes, stabilize our breathing, and focus very hard on each part, going from the feet up, examining them – are they warm, cold, tense or relaxed, tired, or perhaps rested? We wonder what each body part is “saying to us.” And so on up to the top of our head.
Chinese medicine is increasingly appreciated – and rightly so. Acupressure has been known there for more than seven thousand years. What is hidden under this term? The task of acupressure is to press on particular points on our body in order to unblock flows of vital energy. However, we do not have to make an appointment for massage in a professional salon. It is enough to get an acupressure mat (with spikes in the shape of lotus flowers), roller or massager and do sessions wherever you want – at home, during a break from work. The effects are immediate.
This is another foreign sounding word. Mindfulness is a very well-known form of meditation, helping to focus scattered thoughts by concentrating on a chosen object or activity – analyzing, breaking it down, thinking and concentrating only on it. Let’s try to endure in such a state for as long as possible, and at the end breathe deeply, returning to reality. Thanks to mindfulness we will undoubtedly achieve emotional balance.
Finally, we encourage you to do a very universal exercise, which can be done anytime and anywhere. We are talking about visualization. Just close your eyes and let your imagination run wild. Think of a quiet, nice place, focus on the scene, on the smallest details. Let’s feel this fantasy with all our senses, relaxing, and we will find that we will definitely feel better after opening our eyes.
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